


Lady in Waiting

by meretricula



Series: Lady in Waiting [1]
Category: Tortall - Tamora Pierce
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-24
Updated: 2016-10-24
Packaged: 2018-08-24 11:38:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8370868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meretricula/pseuds/meretricula
Summary: Princess Shinkokami arrives in Tortall with three ladies in waiting, not two.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thisisthemorning](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisisthemorning/gifts).



> This fic contains a fight scene involving child characters, at a level of violence consistent with the original canon.

Crammed onto the edge of the bed in a too-small cabin aboard a ship docked in Port Caynn, Lady Keladry of Mindelan sighed and reminded herself, not for the first time that day, that she was stone. “Everything is going to be fine, Cricket,” she said. 

Her imperial mistress, Princess Shinkokami of the Yamani Islands, was not noticeably reassured. “I will forget to speak in Common!” she moaned, in faintly accented Common. “I will forget my Tortallan manners! What if I bow to the prince instead of curtsying? What if I offend his mother? What if — “

“Everything will be _fine_ ,” Keladry repeated. “Your Common is perfect. You’re speaking it right now. You’ve been practicing how to act with Tortallan nobility since the day we met. And even if you do make a mistake, which you won’t, everyone will think that you’re charming and love you that much more.” 

Shinkokami flipped her fan open and hid her face in mock embarrassment — she and Keladry had long since given up trying to hide their emotions from each other — and laughed, calmer now. “Do you really think so?” 

“Yes,” Keladry said firmly. Before she could elaborate on the many ways in which Shinkokami would be beloved by the Tortallan people and, more importantly, her future husband’s family, there was a brief rap on the door. “Come in,” Kel called. 

The door opened, and a short Yamani woman in full court dress and makeup stuck her head into the room. “Is Her Highness ready yet? Prince Eitaro is impatient.” 

“I will be ready when I am ready,” Shinkokami said. Keladry’s exasperated gaze briefly met that of Lady Yukimi, a childhood friend to both her and the princess, before her face took on a neutral expression once more as Yuki stepped into the cabin, followed by Lady Haname. Prince Eitaro's wife, Princess Murasaki, poked her head in after Haname but withdrew without speaking, presumably to return to her husband and report on Shinkokami's state of dress. 

“Your Highness, our Tortallan escort is waiting for us,” Lady Haname said. “It would be rude to delay further.” Unlike Yukimi and Kel, she had not been a member of Shinkokami’s circle before the princess’s marriage to the Tortallan prince was arranged, and her presence changed the atmosphere in the cabin. Shinkokami snapped her fan shut and rose to her feet, her face a smooth mask that betrayed none of her earlier nervousness or amusement. 

“Very well,” the princess said. “Do I require any adjustments?” 

Keladry stood as well, and together with Yuki and Haname scrutinized Shinkokami’s appearance. Finding nothing amiss, she glanced down at herself and adjusted the shukusen tucked into her obi, reassuring herself that she could draw it easily if needed. She would be happier when she could change out of her heavy embroidered kimono and reclaim her glaive, but for this first impression on the Tortallan people, all of the Yamani princess’s ladies in waiting would be decked out in the full splendor of Yamani formal dress — even the lone Tortallan among them. 

Surrounded by three noted Yamani beauties, Keladry stuck out like a sore thumb despite her kimono. At age fifteen she was already tall for a Tortallan woman, and towered a full head above her imperial mistress. The cream silk of her kimono with its blue-gray borders — Mindelan colors — suited her light hair and hazel eyes well enough, but with broad shoulders, a thickly muscled waist and no breasts or hips to speak of, she resembled nothing so much as a box with a ribbon tied around her middle. But then, Kel reminded herself, she had not come with Shinkokami to be an ornament of her court. 

“Stay behind me, please,” she said politely, and opened the cabin door in order to scan the deck for threats. Finding none — she had not expected any now that they were in Tortallan territory, but an excess of caution was infinitely preferable to carelessness — she stepped aside and allowed Shinkokami to walk out into the sunlight. Kel followed the princess, Haname and Yuki close behind her, her hand on her deadly fan the entire way. 

*

Ashore in Port Caynn, a small group of Tortallans waited with varying levels of patience for the Yamani princess and her companions to dock. "I do so hope she's pretty," drawled the youngest of the company, a tall youth with brilliant green eyes and a deep widow's peak. "I'm not entirely sure how to reconcile my knightly duty to speak the truth with my noble obligation to tell my prince what makes him happy, if she turns out to be a fright." 

Two hands, one from each of the adults standing to either side of him, immediately connected with the back of his head. "Mind your tongue," the man to his left said mildly. "If your mother hears you talk about a woman like that, your knightly duties will be the least of your worries."

"If _I_ hear you talk about a woman like that again," said the woman standing to the youth's right, "you'll be lucky if you still _have_ a tongue, Squire Nealan. Consider yourself warned." 

"Apologies, my lady," Nealan said with a bow, clearly cowed by the woman's threat if not his father's. "It won't happen again." 

She nodded sharply and seemed to put him out of her mind immediately, leaning forward to speak with her other companion. She was by far too short to talk over Nealan's head, but managed a similar effect nonetheless. "What's your opinion of all this fuss and nonsense, Baird?" she asked. "I haven't heard you say anything one way or the other." 

Duke Baird of Queenscove lifted one shoulder in an elegant shrug. "I will be grateful when the treaty is formally sealed and we may all return to our routine," he said, "but I do not think 'all this fuss and bother' is too much to ask for a lasting alliance with Yaman. You have too much of a warrior's turn of mind, Alanna, and too little appreciation for diplomacy." 

"All this fuss and bother is very well for us," muttered Nealan, who has clearly bitten his tongue for as long as he was able. "Roald's the one who has to marry her." 

"Are you offering to take his place?" inquired his father. "You are fortunate that our king has not required such a sacrifice of any family but his own. He may yet send one of your sisters, or a Naxen daughter, if Tusaine ever seems amenable." 

"It's barbaric," Nealan insisted. "Roald isn't a -- a prize stallion to put out to stud. He's a human being." 

"So is the princess," Alanna said dryly. "Speaking of whom -- I believe the Yamani party is about to disembark." She gestured to the ship, where a group of soldiers accompanied one older man and woman and four younger ones in brightly colored robes across the deck to the gangplank. "Which one is Shinkokami, do you suppose?"

"I can tell you which one _isn't_ ," Nealan said. "Bright Mithros, that girl is a giant. Is she _Scanran_?" 

"No, she's Tortallan. Ilane of Seabeth and Seajen -- Ilane of Mindelan now -- her youngest daughter is a lady in waiting to the Yamani princess, if I recall correctly," Baird said absently. "I suppose that must be her. Ilane was always tall for her age. I don't remember the girl's name." 

"But you certainly remember her mother, I see," Alanna teased. 

"We used to dance together, when we were young," Baird said with great dignity. His son made a horrible face, although he quickly corrected himself when Alanna kicked him in the ankle. "I don't know Mindelan as well, but he's done very good work for his Majesty in Yaman. I can't begrudge him the privilege of establishing his daughter's position with our future queen. There aren't many of Jon's nobles who speak even a word of Yamani -- if the girl is clever, she'll make herself indispensable." 

"I suppose," Nealan said, already bored with talk of court intrigue, and turned back to Alanna. "What new and exciting learning experiences will our guests present, Knight-Mistress mine? Have you already arranged for my tutelage in Yamani combat? Or the healing of Yamani sniffles?"

"You are insolent, Squire Nealan," Alanna said without the heat of her earlier reprimand. "But since you are so eager for further instruction in the Yamani culture, I will certainly see that you receive it. In the meantime, I am assured by Master Oakbridge that you are at least competent to avoid giving offense to our noble visitors -- pray exert yourself, as you so rarely avoid giving offense even to your own countrymen."

"It will be my constant study, O best and most illustrious of knight-masters," Nealan said with a jerky bow. 

"If you two are quite finished," Baird murmured. "I believe it is time to welcome the princess to her new home. Neal, please see that the Own are ready?" 

"Yes, Father." With a much more respectful bob of his head, Nealan withdrew to join the company of the King's Own behind them, leaving the duke and Lady Alanna to formally greet the Yamani delegation. 

The lone man of the group -- some prince or other, Alanna thought, although from what she could recall of the information the master of deportment had attempted to hammer into her and Baird before they left Corus, every third lordling in Yaman seemed related closely enough to the emperor to rank as a prince -- was clearly the leader of their party, but she found her gaze straying to the Tortallan girl during his speech of introduction. At closer distance her hair was light brown, not Scanran blond, but Nealan's mistake was understandable: she was remarkably tall, especially considering the remnants of baby fat that still clung to her cheeks. Her face was nearly as impassive as the rest of the princess's ladies, but her eyes never stopped moving, darting from one angle to the next. 

_She's watching the roofs for an archer,_ Alanna thought suddenly. _And the crowd for a fanatic with a knife._

The Yamani prince's speech finally came to an end, and Alanna wrenched her attention back to the duty at hand. Her cheeks stretched into an artificial smile as she stepped forward, inwardly cursing the game of stone, paper, knife that she had lost to Baird on the ride to Port Caynn. 

"On behalf of their majesties, Jonathan of Conte and Thayet the Peerless, and his royal highness Prince Roald, it is my duty and my pleasure to welcome you to Tortall," she began. "Princess Shinkokami, it is our deepest wish that you will be happy in your new home. I am Lady Alanna of Pirate's Swoop and Olau, and my companion is Duke Baird of Queenscove; two squads of the First Company of the King's Own have been placed under my command for your honor and protection. If you will accept our escort, we will be privileged to accompany you to Corus." 

The woman who Alanna assumed to be Shinkokami, as she wore the most elaborate robe of the ladies and stood in the center of the small group, bowed in the Yamani fashion toward Alanna and Baird. The other women and the Yamani prince followed suit a heartbeat behind, and Alanna returned the gesture with an eye on Baird to match the depth of his obeisance; when she straightened, the princess had stepped forward and drawn her fan. "On my own behalf and that of my imperial uncle, I thank you for your welcome," Shinkokami said in a clear, carrying voice. Her command of Common was excellent, Alanna noted; it had been one of several concerns raised about a foreign bride for Roald. She was also pretty enough that Neal would have no difficulty making a full report to the prince. "I am honored to accept your escort, Alanna of Pirate's Swoop and Olau." 

Shinkokami snapped her fan open and held it up to her face, concealing her mouth. Alanna could see her eyes sparkle above the edge of the fan and thought that the princess just might have a quality more valuable still in a royal bride than a pretty face and a common language: a sense of humor. "Are you truly Sir Alanna of Trebond, the lady knight? The King's Champion?" 

"I am," Alanna said cautiously. "Is there a problem, your highness?" 

"Not at all! What a wonderful omen for my life in my new home, that you are the first to greet me. I have heard so many tales about you from my dear Keladry, you see," the princess explained, "it is almost as though I know you already." 

The Tortallan girl bowed again, more deeply. Even when bowing she never took her hand from the fan tucked into her peculiar wide sash, and Alanna wondered if she was reaching for a more accustomed dagger, or if the fan itself was a weapon. "It's an honor to meet you, Champion," the girl -- Keladry -- said softly. She met Alanna's eyes briefly, then returned her attention to scanning the surroundings. 

"The honor is ours," Baird said, after what Alanna realized must have been an awkwardly long pause while she watched Keladry watch the crowd. "I believe I am acquainted with your mother -- Keladry, is it? Ilane was a friend of mine in our youth. You have the look of her."

Keladry bowed yet again. "I am honored that you think so, your grace," she said.

"The Lady Ilane is truly a light of my imperial uncle's court," Shinkokami said to Baird. She moved forward yet again, this time to take his arm, and motioned for Keladry to rejoin the loose semi-circle of ladies in waiting at her back. "We have been grateful for her presence there, and I look forward to meeting her again as a member of King Jonathan's. Would you tell me more of your memories of her? Was this during His Majesty's father's reign?" 

As they spoke, Baird led the princess up to the waiting carriage so they could begin the journey back to Corus -- one day's ride, but at least a two-day journey for an entourage of their size, and more if they lingered much longer on the shore. There was a silent consultation on the part of the three ladies after the princess and her aunt and uncle were seated with Baird, which concluded in Keladry joining her mistress while the other two attendants climbed into the smaller, less opulent vehicle behind them. Alanna went to rejoin Nealan and their horses, grateful for the limited space inside the princess's carriage. If she could stay on horseback with Neal for the entire journey, she might be able to avoid noble small talk entirely. 

* 

Kel rose at first light, already anticipating a chance to go through her morning routine somewhere other than a tiny ship cabin. Shinko slept through all of her strengthening exercises and showed no signs of stirring by the time Kel had picked up her practice glaive. Normally Kel would have dumped her mistress out of bed without mercy and forced her to attend morning practice, but under the circumstances she was willing to let Shinko sleep a little longer. Instead she opened the adjoining door to the room Yuki was sharing with Haname and shook her friend awake. 

"What? What's happening? Is Shinko all right?" Yuki demanded, sitting bolt upright. Her hair stuck out at all angles from her head like some sort of demented bird's nest, and Kel thought, not for the first time, that no one who had met the elegant Lady Yukimi noh Daiomoru would recognize Yuki when she first woke up in the morning. 

"Everything's fine," she said softly. "Shinko's still asleep. Would you sit up in her room until I get back? I want to go down to the courtyard to go through my pattern dances." 

Yuki failed to acknowledge Kel's request with more than a grunt, but by the time Kel had left the room she was already shaking Lady Haname. Shinko would be entirely safe under their watch until Kel returned. Even so, Kel took the steps down to the inn's courtyard at a trot. She never liked being away from Shinkokami's side for longer than necessary. 

Despite the early hour, the yard was already busy with animals and hostlers. Kel found a space where she thought she would be out of the way and took a deep breath, clearing her mind as she began her first practice dance. Nariko, the tough old armsmistress who had supervised Kel's training at the emperor's court, always told her that she was too impatient. Even now, after years of practice, she disliked sitting quietly to meditate, although she knew better than to say so to Nariko or any of her other teachers. It was easier to find the calm inside herself as she moved through the familiar motions of her dances. With her glaive in her hand, Kel didn't need to think of stone or still water to focus or quiet her emotions. She thought of nothing but the next step in her dance. 

When she finally lowered her glaive, maybe a half-bell later, Kel realized that she had acquired an audience. The hostlers and stable-boys were clustered along the stable wall, watching her with wide eyes; a little further off stood a young man dressed in the colors of Lady Alanna's shield. Kel hadn't spoken to him the previous day, but she assumed he was a part of the retinue King Jonathan had sent to accompany Shinkokami. 

"That's a big weapon for a girl," he drawled. 

Kel kept her face smooth as she scrambled internally for the right vocabulary to run him off without openly giving offense. She had practiced speaking Common with Shinko, but most of her conversations, even with her parents and sisters, had been conducted in Yamani for almost all her life. She was afraid she had lost some of the subtleties she would require, dealing with Tortallan nobles who had decided to make themselves unpleasant. To add insult to injury, the young man spoke with a very different accent than she was used to. It took her an extra moment to understand what he was saying. "On the contrary," Kel said. "A glaive allows a smaller opponent to hold off a larger one. All the imperial ladies are trained to use one, in the Islands."

"I can't imagine you'll have too many opponents who are larger than you when you finish growing, even if you are a girl," the young man said frankly. He bowed Yamani-style -- sloppily and at the wrong angle, Kel noted critically, although she remained silent -- and smiled when he stood upright again. "Nealan of Queenscove at your service, milady. You're really very impressive."

Kel thought about returning the gesture in kind with a Tortallan curtsy, but decided against it; without a skirt it would look ridiculous. Instead she bowed, more correctly than young Queenscove had. "I thank you for the compliment, sir, but I am only a humble student. I am Keladry of Mindelan," she added, belatedly realizing that he had no way of knowing who she was. Despite his snobby accent, Nealan didn't seem malicious. "I'm one of Princess Shinkokami's ladies in waiting." 

"Delighted to make your acquaintance, but you can leave off the 'sir' -- I haven't earned it yet." When Kel tilted her head to the side, politely quizzical, he explained, "I'm only a squire still. You can call me Neal if you like."

"Thank you, Squire Neal," Kel said solemnly. The smile in Neal's eyes summoned an answering one of her own, which she squashed with the ease of long practice. "I'm sure we will be able to become better acquainted soon, but you will please excuse me for now. I must return to the princess." 

*

"I met Lady Alanna's squire down in the courtyard," Kel remarked, mostly to Yuki, as they helped Shinko put up her hair. "Nealan of Queenscove, he said his name was. He was a very strange young man, but I think he meant well."

"Queenscove," Yuki said. "He must be related to Duke Baird. They are one of the great houses, are they not?"

"Queenscove, ha Minchi, Naxen, Legann," Shinko recited with a sigh. "The oldest houses of Tortall. You liked this Nealan, Keladry?" 

"I suppose," Kel said. "We didn't talk for that long. I thought he was going to be awful about my using a glaive, but he wasn't."

"No one who has seen you use your glaive would dare be awful about it, Keladry," Yuki said, eyes laughing. 

"No, no," Kel demurred reflexively, lifting her hand to cover her mouth in lieu of a fan. "I'm only a student, Yuki. He trains with Lady Alanna! Imagine studying with such a hero. I'm sure my glaive is nothing special to him." 

"You may be a student, but you are a credit to your teachers," Lady Haname said unexpectedly. "Armsmistress Nariko's protege need not fear comparison, even with the pupil of the Lioness." 

Kel bowed to hide her flushed face until Shinko requested some small adjustment to her hair ornaments, all three Yamani ladies politely ignoring her embarrassment. "Presentable," Yuki said at last. "I wonder what the fashions are like at the Tortallan court? Maybe we won't have to spend so much time on your hair once we arrive." 

"Tortallan fashions will learn to follow my lead," Shinko said grandly. Yuki and Kel exchanged quick glances and then attacked with the brushes they used to apply Shinko's rice powder makeup, tickling mercilessly until the princess shrieked with giggles. Haname looked on tolerantly; Kel thought she might have even seen a tiny smile dancing at the corner of her mouth. 

*

At breakfast, while Shinko conversed with Prince Eitaro and Duke Baird, Kel found herself face to face with Nealan of Queenscove once more. She looked discreetly for his knight-mistress, but Lady Alanna had not joined them to eat. "So do all the ladies in the Islands use that pigsticker you were practicing with, Lady Keladry?" Nealan asked. 

Yuki, seated beside Kel, looked up immediately at the hint of an insult. "All the women of the imperial court are trained in the use of naginata, sir," she said coolly. Kel thought that she was irritated enough that she had forgotten her worries about her accent, which normally made her speak very slowly and carefully in Common. "Although Lady Keladry's education has, of course, concentrated on the warlike arts more than most." 

Neal turned to Yuki and smiled, clearly oblivious. "It's just Neal, no sir — I'm only a squire. What's your name, my lady?" 

Kel interceded before the hapless squire could offend Yuki any worse. "Lady Yukimi noh Daiomoru, may I present Squire Nealan of Queenscove? He's not trying to be rude," she added in Yamani. "He's only a foreigner and he doesn't know any better, don't ruffle up like that. You look like an angry pigeon." Haname, on Yuki's far side, pretended not to hear them with a perfectly smooth expression that Kel envied. 

"It's an honor to meet you, Lady Yukimi," Nealan said with apparent sincerity. To Kel's private relief, Yuki unbent enough to murmur something gracious, which Neal took as an invitation to pursue the conversation further. "Why do you say that Lady Keladry's education was — how did you put it? More concentrated in war?" 

"I have been a lady in waiting to Princess Shinkokami for many years," Kel said quietly, willing Yuki to let the matter rest there. "Naturally, my teachers wished me to be able to protect her by strength of arms, should the need arise." 

"Oh, like the queen's ladies," Nealan said, nodding. "That makes sense. Can't always rely on there being a man-at-arms on hand, and all that. How did you wind up with that job, if you don't mind my asking? Is it unusual that you aren't Yamani?" 

Shinkokami turned, her attention finally drawn away from her conversation with the prince and Duke Baird at precisely the worst possible moment. "There was an assassination attempt on my family when we were children," she said, dryly factual. "My parents and my younger brother were killed, but Keladry and I ran outside. She was able to hold the assassins off until my family's retainers heard the noise and came to find me." Shinkokami paused before adding, "It has pleased my imperial uncle that Keladry be my closest companion since that day. The house of Mindelan has done itself great honor in the eyes of the empire." 

Put like that, it was a straightforward sequence of events. It had not felt that way at the time. Kel focused on not falling into too-vivid memories, instead keeping her expression smooth, like a lake after the ripples from a thrown rock had died away. _I am calm water,_ she told herself. _I am a cloudless sky. I am stone._

"How old were you?" she heard Duke Baird ask, as if from far away. 

"We were ten," Shinkokami replied for them both. She took Kel's hand under the table and squeezed briefly, which shamed her as much as it reassured her. Shinko had lost her entire family that day; if anyone had a right to avoid remembering, it was her. "But we profit the present little by dwelling on the past. Squire Nealan, your father tells me that you and Prince Roald were children together. Will you tell me about him?" The princess smiled very graciously, and Neal turned a dull brick red. Judging from his father's amused expression, Kel guessed that his lapse into silence, followed by a profusion of stuttering, was not typical. 

"Ignorant savages," Yuki muttered to her in Yamani while their seatmates were distracted. "How can they not know how you saved Shinkokami with your _pigsticker_? It's why the emperor chose his own niece for their prince, when I'm sure they should have been happy with any princess at all!" 

"The emperor chose Shinko because Princess Chisakami was killed in an earthquake," Kel murmured back. "It wasn't because of me. I would have gone with her no matter who she married." 

" _You_ would have gone anywhere," Yuki said. "I'm not so sure _she_ would have." A single glance from Haname silenced her more effectively than anything Kel could have said, and they all applied themselves to their food, even the insatiably curious Nealan of Queenscove.

*

The remaining half-day's journey to Corus was spent crammed once again into a carriage, although Shinkokami did manage to negotiate to share with her ladies in waiting rather than Prince Eitaro and Duke Baird after the prince had rejected out of hand her proposal to view some of her new home from horseback. "'Entirely improper, my dear princess,'" Yuki mimicked once they were shut up in the carriage. "I cannot wait until he returns to the Islands with his entirely _proper_ — "

"Yuki!" Kel hissed. Shinko pretended not to have heard; Haname snapped her fan open and then shut again without using it or making any other sort of comment. The longer they spent trapped in small spaces together, the more Kel suspected that Haname actually had an excellent sense of humor, and found Shinkokami's other attendants very amusing. 

"Why don't you invite your new friend to join us, Keladry?" Shinko suggested mildly. She kept her gaze fixed on Yukimi as she added, "I'm sure we all would benefit from his conversation." 

Kel hesitated, but an imperial command was an imperial command, so despite Yuki's silent indignation she leaned out the carriage door and called Nealan of Queenscove over. "I'll have to ask Lady Alanna," he said, frowning, but when applied to the lady knight waved her hand and said he might as well enjoy the company of his fellow young people. 

"I'm to be trapped with my fellow elders observing the proprieties, so it's not as though you'll be missing out on useful instruction," she said, while Keladry stifled a shocked giggle. "And there's what, four of them and one of you? I think you'll be adequately chaperoned. Off you go, shoo," and after a brief but heated debate in Yamani over seating arrangements Kel found herself beside Nealan, facing a slightly squashed row of Yamani ladies. Yuki, carefully placed in the center where both the princess and Haname's elbows could reach her with ease, watched Neal from over her fan with a particularly bland look in her eyes which Kel knew from long experience betokened nothing good. 

"Would you tell me a little about your weapons training, Squire Neal?" she asked hastily. "I have something of a personal interest in the subject." 

"Oh, yes, do," Shinko chimed in. "Keladry has told me so many exciting stories about your Tortallan knights. She was to become a page," she pronounced carefully, "when Lord Piers and Lady Ilane returned to Tortall, but of course then she remained with me in the Islands instead." 

"I don't know that any girls have ever applied for page training since King Jonathan issued the decree that it was open to them," Neal said. "It's a shame you didn't have the chance. And you're what, sixteen now? We might have even been in the same year, if you had." 

"Only imagine how different your life would be, Keladry," Yuki said mischievously. "No more crawling out of bed hours before dawn to let Nariko beat you with sticks, followed by hours of etiquette and statecraft and exactly how to bow to an upstart lord to insult him without giving an excuse for a war, then more hours of practice with every weapon for which Nariko could find you an instructor. Not to mention having to not fall asleep in your food and learning to help arrange her highness's hair." 

"No, actually, that sounds about right," Neal said. "Except for the part to do with the princess's hair. A fair amount of our weapons training is done on horseback, though — I remember reading somewhere that there's less mounted warfare in Yaman." 

"The terrain renders it impractical in many circumstances," Haname agreed. "The princess's ladies have all learned to ride, of course, but not in combat — at least, it is not part of a court lady's usual training," she added, turning to Kel in polite inquiry. 

"Nor mine, I'm afraid," Kel said. "I did learn a little about swordfighting on horseback, when I grew tall enough that my teachers thought I might be creditable at it, but my primary weapon has always been the naginata — a glaive," she clarified to Neal. "And glaive fighting is customarily done on foot. Perhaps your court weaponsmaster will be willing to instruct me, once we are in Corus. What weapons are you taught to use?" 

"Well, lance, of course, but we also…" Neal proved surprisingly willing to discuss training and technique with them all, and even showed an interest in learning how Yamani methods differed from Tortallan. By the time their procession of carriages and armed guards reached the palace, Kel was sorry to part company from him, and Yuki had forgotten her grudge entirely. 

"That was well conceived and even better executed; I salute you," she murmured in Shinkokami's ear as Neal and Yuki, having already disembarked from the carriage, continued their debate about archery on the ground. Shinko allowed herself to smile. 

"What an unfortunate omen, if after all our years of diplomacy lessons I couldn't find a way to make peace between my second favorite companion and one of my husband's childhood companions," she replied, equally low-voiced. 

"Only second-favorite?" Kel teased. 

"Don't fish for compliments, Keladry; it ill-suits the dignity of your future position as a queen's favorite lady in waiting," Shinko said, mock-solemn, and with all the conscious dignity of _her_ future position, stepped down from the carriage to enter their new home. 

*

Kel knew she was dreaming, but it didn't seem to matter: she couldn't change what was about to happen. She was ten years old again, kneeling at the table in Cricket's family's house, waiting for lunch to be served. She was hungry after a morning of weapons practice, and proud that she was keeping her face smooth like a proper Yamani child, and prouder of the edged blade on the new naginata that Nariko had begun allowing her to train with only a week ago. Cricket's father had teased her a little, very gently, about carrying her weapon inside, but his eyes had been smiling, so Kel knew that it was all right to keep the prized glaive where it was, sitting beside her on the floor. She was happy to be surrounded by her friend's family who had been so kind to her and anxious about telling them that she would have to go back to Tortall with her parents soon, and even though the part of Kel that knew it was a dream was screaming at her to watch out, she didn't look up at the servants carrying in trays of food until one of them had drawn a dagger and slit Cricket's father's throat. 

Blood sprayed across the table, ruining Kel's kimono and leaving dots like freckles across Cricket's cheeks and nose. Cricket's mother lunged forward to cover her infant son as another assassin descended with a knife, and Kel scrambled to her feet, clutching her glaive in one hand and Cricket's arm in the other. Cricket was breathing in shallow gasps, already scrabbling for her shukusen in her obi, but she allowed herself to be dragged away. "Run!" Kel demanded, desperately calculating how much time Cricket's mother might buy them -- she had only been armed with a dagger, but the assassins had had no swords or polearms that Kel had seen -- and listening for footsteps coming after them. 

She and Cricket tumbled out of the long hallway into the gardens, which were unnervingly serene and even more unnervingly deserted. There should have been gardeners. There should have been _guards_. "Is there anywhere we can hide?" Kel asked. There was a small stone temple in the center of a rock garden to their left, but no other cover that she could see. 

"Not that we could reach before they come after us," Cricket said. She had already laid a thin veneer of Yamani calm over her terror, but the hand that held her shukusen was shaking. "There's too much open ground. Keladry, you should try to run away. I don't think they'll chase you if you're not with me." 

"Don't be ridiculous," Kel said. The stone temple was close, and it had a roof and only one entrance. Kel thought about her mother standing in a narrow hallway with a glaive to defend her and the sacred swords from pirates, and made her decision. "Come on, run." 

Cricket stumbled gamely after her despite the pebbles that bruised their feet through their thin indoor slippers. "If you give me your glaive, I can defend myself and you can escape," she bargained as they skidded into the temple -- really only a shrine -- with its smooth polished floors. 

"Just stay behind me," Kel said. She settled herself in the open doorway with a single nod over her shoulder to the tiny altar and a silent apology to the gods for not taking the time to kneel. "Keep your shukusen out. If anyone gets past me, you'll have to finish them off." 

"I should -- "

"I'm better with a glaive, and I'm bigger," Kel said flatly. "Stay behind me." Standing just barely inside the doorway meant she couldn't see the exit of the hallway she and Cricket had used to escape, but she could hear shouting coming closer, and she doubted it came from anyone coming to help them. 

When they were finally discovered, it was almost an anticlimax. "I found the foreign girl," the man called. Two others joined him, but neither was the man who had cut Cricket's father's throat. Kel made a mental note that there were at least four assassins and shifted her grip on her glaive. "Get out of the way, little foreigner," the first man said. "We have no quarrel with you."

She stared up at him in silence. He was a grown man, bigger than she was, but only by six inches or so, and she had her glaive while he was armed only with a dagger. More importantly, he didn't consider her a threat. "Maybe she doesn't understand," one of the other men said behind him, and while he was distracted, Kel swung her glaive up and around in a motion she had practiced over and over, in pattern dances and with blunted children's weapons and finally with this new, freshly sharpened one, and gutted him. 

The blood went everywhere. She had never used an edged weapon with the intent to hurt someone before, and no one had ever warned Kel to close her eyes. The other two men cursed loudly, but they hung back instead of pressing their advantage while Kel blinked her eyes clear, so she had time to kick the fallen man's dagger behind her, although she didn't dare look down long enough to cut his throat. He would bleed out quickly enough, she thought, and without a weapon he wasn't much of a danger so long as she was careful not to trip over him. "Cricket," she said, keeping her eyes on the two remaining assassins. 

"I have it," Cricket confirmed. 

"If you have a clear shot," Kel said in Common, "throw it." 

"I'll do my best not to hit you by mistake," Cricket said in the same language, and then the men attacked and Kel had to save her breath for fighting. They could only come at her one at a time and the reach of her weapon was so much longer than theirs that they had no choice but to be cautious, so it felt almost like a strange training exercise that Nariko had thought up. She could never quite settle into the motions of it, though, because in the back of her mind was the constant nagging thought that if she failed, if she made even the smallest mistake, they would kill Cricket, and it would be her fault. Objectively she knew that Cricket had the dagger and was much better with a shukusen than Kel herself and could probably hold off at least one attacker, but it didn't seem to help. 

"Cricket," Kel said again. The two men she was fighting had stepped back for the moment to catch their breath; she couldn't move out of the doorway to press them, so she had no choice but to wait. 

"I'm here," Cricket said. 

"Good," Kel said. 

"Where did you think I would have gone?" Cricket asked, almost laughing. "Keladry, you are so strange." 

"Not so strange as some," Kel said mildly. One of the assassins looked ready to close with her again, so she braced herself, glaive at the ready. This had gone on longer than any exercise Nariko had ever subjected her to, and she was beginning to tire. "When this is over I'm never letting you out of my sight again, you know." 

"When this is over," Cricket said, "you may eat at my right hand and sleep at the foot of my bed until our dying day, with my goodwill." 

"I'm going to hold you to that," Kel said. She met the renewed attack with caution and an open ear: there was more shouting coming from the house. There was no way to tell whether that meant help for them or for the assassins, but the man fighting Kel was beginning to make nervous mistakes. When he retreated to bandage up his arm -- tired or not, no student of Nariko's would let an enemy's opening go unpunished -- his companion swore, threw down his dagger, and ran. The remaining man stared at Kel for a long moment, visibly weighing his options, before following suit. 

"I think... Cricket, I think we're safe," Kel said. She turned her back on the corpse lying in front of the doorway and stepped inside the shrine for the first time. 

"There's blood all over your face, are you all right?" Cricket asked. She had been hovering by the altar, well out of Kel's way, but now she hurried forward to meet her in spite of her quick nod. "I was so afraid you would be hurt, Keladry." 

"I'll never complain about Nariko's training again," Kel half-joked, thinking about the dead man behind her with a lurch to her stomach. Better to kill a man than let him hurt her or Cricket, of course, and that was why Nariko taught the court ladies to fight in the first place. "We should go find my parents, I think. Cricket, do you know why -- "

A heartbeat too late, Kel saw Cricket's eyes widen. Her hand flashed up and forward just barely wide of Kel's shoulder, and then there was a choked gurgle from the doorway. "I think it would be very good to see Lady Ilane," Cricket agreed. 

Rather than spin around to confront whatever threat Cricket had just dealt with, Kel took her cue from her friend's calm voice and knelt at the altar instead. She knew she owed the gods more than a brief prayer of thanks if she and Cricket had really escaped their pursuers, but the stone floor was cool and comforting under her forehead as she promised to return later, and she thought they, being divine and in possession of all the time in the world, would probably understand. 

Cricket was waiting when she got back to her feet. "Do you want -- " Kel asked, gesturing with her glaive in an offer to stand guard. 

"No, thank you, Keladry," Cricket said. Her face was impassive as she gazed at the altar. "Let's go." 

Kel paused to drop to her knees once more as they passed the man Cricket had killed. There was no sense in leaving the dagger behind, not when they had no idea what was waiting for them outside. The face staring up at her as she wiped the blade clean on her own kimono was familiar: it was the fourth assassin, the one who had killed Cricket's father. Then Kel blinked, and even though she knew, she _knew_ that this wasn't what happened next — she gave the knife back to Cricket and the emperor's soldiers found them and they were _safe_ — it was Cricket lying on the ground beside her, ten years old with a gaping wound in her throat. "No," Kel said. She looked down and saw her own hands, too big to belong to her ten-year-old self, capably cleaning Cricket's blood from the dagger, and then it wasn't Cricket as a child anymore, it was Shinkokami in her wedding kimono, bleeding out all over again because Kel had failed her, and — " _No!_ " Kel screamed. 

"Wake up, Keladry! It's just a dream, wake up!" 

"Cricket?" Kel croaked. Shinko was leaning over her bed, her hair sliding out of its night-time braid to frame her face in heavy waves. "I was — "

"You were having the dream again," Shinkokami said. "It's all right. You saved me, remember? I didn't die. I'm right here, I didn't die." 

"Oh," Kel said. She shook her head and tried to focus on details of the present, like the fact that Shinkokami was not only out of bed in the middle of the night but barefoot and wearing only a thin nightgown. "Sorry. I didn't mean to wake you. You should go back to sleep. I'll just…" She gestured vaguely toward Shinko's rumpled bed on the other side of the room. "It'll be just like when we were ten." 

"Don't be ridiculous, you're too tall to sleep at my feet anymore," Shinko said. Before Kel could even process the stab of hurt that accompanied her words, she added, "Just share with me, I'll take the side next to the wall. You can still be between me and the door." 

"I want to sit up and keep watch for a while instead," Kel argued. 

" _Kel_." Shinko had climbed back into her bed and crawled as far over as she could; now she held the blanket up in an impatient invitation. "I'll make it an imperial command if I have to." 

"I'm going to protect you," Kel said as she settled into bed, determined to stay alert but already half-asleep. "You'll see. No one in this kingdom or any other will ever hurt you so long as I'm here." 

"Yes," Shinkokami agreed with a yawn. "I know. Don't worry, Keladry. You're going to be my champion. I know you'll always save me."

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Halloween, thisisthemorning! I was so excited to be assigned someone who loves Kel as much as I do. She is the BEST. Wishing you a delightful holiday full of your preferred candy and fics about all your favorite fandoms!


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